28 THE VINE AND CIVILISATION. 
of Rome, to the detriment of the Gallican Church and the 
rights of the people. 
‘*Could this prince have known the generous influence of 
wine upon character? We are inclined to think that he did, 
for he had the large vineyards destroyed, and limited the 
quantity of land which each proprietor could be allowed to 
plant with the vine. 
‘* By one of those striking coincidences which history offers 
us a few examples, it was the king of St. Bartholomew, the 
cut-throat of Christians, like the abominable Domitian, who 
opposed in France the culture of the vine. 
‘* On the other hand, the encouragements afterwards given 
by Henry IV. and Louis XIV. to vine culture were not slow in 
producing their effects. Under these glorious reigns there 
soon appeared on the horizon tliat luminous literary constella- 
tion, of which Corneille, Molliere, Racine, Pascal, La Fon- 
taine and Fenelon were the most brilliant stars. 
‘‘A literature full of wit, of warmth and of conviction, was 
succeeded by a literature polished but cold, spiritual but with- 
out true genius. Who does not perceive the cerebral stimula- 
tions produced by coffee in the writings of Voltaire, of Diderot, 
of Dalembert, of Grimm, of Beaumarchais? What vivacity in 
the features, what wit in the least distich, what refined criti- 
cism! These men understood and spoke of everything in a 
fascinating manner, and laughed nearly at everything; they 
buried under sarcasms the old French monarchy and _ultra- 
montanism, the death-throes of which had already been an- 
nounced in the edicts of Louis XV. against the cultivation of 
the vine. 
‘‘ The alternate influences of wine and of coffee made them- 
selves felt with an equal intensity until 1815. At that epoch 
the liberators of France left in exchange for the millions they 
